The freakishly cold ice, sleet and
snow storm ripping through the Southern states and striking fear in
residents unaccustomed to such weather will continue through Wednesday
as the unusually cold winter in Dixie refuses to let up.

The
thick band of nasty weather has already plunged Georgia, South
Carolina, North Carolina, Louisiana and Mississippi into states of
emergency, shut down the New Orleans airport and left an astonishing over 5,000 students stranded at schools in Georgia and Alabama for hours or even overnight.

While
the misery continues in the poorly prepared south, even their neighbors
to the north will endure unusually low temperatures as wind chills in
parts of the Midwest and Plains dip past -30F.

Rare occurrence: Ellie Miller, 5, sleds down a hill at City Park in Gainesville Georgia on Tuesday, after snow showers left enough snow in the usually balmy area for her and her friends to go sledding

Brutal winter: Temperatures will dip yet again on Wednesday night when as far south as the Gulf of Mexico, the mercury will drop below freezing

Forecasters say the front is moving slowly and the icy chill is not expected to leave the region until Thursday.

Highways surrounding the Atlanta that rarely sees snow were converted into treacherous paths of ice Tuesday, causing hundreds of cars to slide off the road, slam into each other. Children were stranded at schools with their teachers, while Governor Nathan Deal made a late-night announcement that he would send state troopers to rescue them.

According to 11alive.com, around 500 students were stuck in Paulding County, Georgia schools overnight.

Cherokee County Schools spokesperson Carrie McGowan said students in high school, middle and elementary schools were stranded due to weather there as well.

'Students who are at school will remain there safely,' said McGowan. 'A parent or guardian can pick their child up if they are able to travel.'

Deal said state and local officials also would try to rescue those stranded along highways that were at a standstill even close to midnight.

Freakishly cold: While Wednesday's highs were expected to bring slightly-above freezing temperatures across the Gulf states, much of the plains, east and northeast remained will below average temps

Stranded: Snow begins to fall in Columbus, Georgia Tuesday evening. Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal says that he will send troopers to schools where students are stranded because they could not make it home on clogged roads caused by a rare snowstorm

What emergency? Sisters Annie, 7, left, and Sara Nivens, 10, right, race down a hill on sleds at City Park in Gainesville Georgia on Tuesday, when the state declared a state of emergency

While only around 50 Atlanta school
children remained stuck in school hours after dismissal Tuesday, the
northern suburb of Marietta saw upwards of 850 stranded students.

And in Hoover, Alabama, 4500 unlucky students had to stick around for hours thanks to dangerous conditions according to CNN.

Also in Georgia and Alabama, Home Depot opened up 26 of its stores to travelers stuck on congested roadways.

'At one store, they even opened up an indoor garden area to be a quiet area to open for reading,' he said.

The
last flight left New Orleans at about 11 a.m. local time on Tuesday and
its Louis Armstrong International Airport was then closed to commercial
traffic ahead of the storm. Authorities also shut the 24-mile (39-km)
Causeway Bridge, which spans Lake Pontchartrain, because of icy
conditions.

Residents
and tourists excited by the novelty of the conditions took photos of
icicles hanging from the wrought-iron balconies of the city's historic
French Quarter.

The sleet, snow, and freezing rains were expected to continue until Thursday

The sleet and snow that plunged the Carolinas, Georgia, Louisiana, and Mississippi into chaos Tuesday was expected to continue Wednesday as the storm slowly moved east

Whatever that feels like: Some residents of Wisconsin and Minnesota can expect to wake up to temperatures that feel like -30F Wednesday morning

Temperatures
are forecast to hit a low of 23 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 5 Celsius) in
New Orleans on Tuesday night and the city could see its first snowfall
in years.

‘This is pretty rare in New Orleans,’
Mike Efferson of the National Weather Service Office in Slidell,
Louisiana, said of the conditions.

‘This only happens about every 10 years.’

New
Orleans' merry Bourbon Street in the French Quarter was oddly quiet as
brass bands and other street performers stayed indoors.

Lee
and Virginia Holt of Wayne, Pennsylvania, walked into Cafe du Monde - a New
Orleans landmark known for its beignets and cafe au lait - after finding
the National World War II Museum closed because of the weather.

Schools
and government offices across a wide swath of the country were closed.
Airlines canceled or delayed thousands of flights, and officials closed
roads as conditions worsened.

North
Carolina and South Carolina were expected to get the most snow, while
the heaviest ice accumulation was forecast from Louisiana to the
Carolinas, the weather service said.

Temperatures
10 to 20 degrees colder than normal were expected to continue for much
of the eastern United States. In Washington, the National Gallery's
skating rink was closed, with officials saying it was too cold for
skaters to be out on the ice.

Jury selection in the corruption trial of a former New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin was suspended because of the weather.

Unaccustomed: The New Orleans Police Department Homeless Assistance Unit assists homeless people to shelters in New Orleans, where temperatures were at decade lows Tuesday

‘We're getting a bit of everything,’
said Jody White, a police sergeant in Opelousas, Louisiana. ‘It's cold.
The sleet is coming down in patches.’

In
Alabama, two people died and five others were hospitalized after a
seven-car pileup on an ice-covered bridge near Montgomery, said Robyn
Litchfield, an Alabama Department of Public Safety spokeswoman.

In
Sandy Springs, near Atlanta, a baby was born in a car stuck in traffic
caused by the storm. The baby and the mother were safe and healthy,
police said.

The baby was delivered by the father and a Sandy Springs police officer.

Brrr! Megan McGowen walks through the snow in Auburn, Alabama as a winter storm that would probably be no big deal in the North all but paralyzed the Deep South on Tuesday

Looking for help: Ronald Carter, who camps at Tillmans Corner in Mobile, Alabama, is spending the night at the Ransom Cafe at West Mobile Baptist Church in Mobile. The church opened its doors to the homeless on Tuesday as temperatures dropped below freezing and sleet blanketed the region

Making the best of it: Clay Fleming, Auburn University sophmore, makes a snow angel on Samford lawn Tuesday

Lawmakers in South Carolina canceled this week's session of the state legislature, citing weather concerns.

The storm took a toll on air travel across the region, with more than 3,000 U.S. flights canceled and hundreds of others delayed, according to flight tracking website FlightAware.com.

The manager of a popular Louisiana grocery store said it was packed with shoppers stocking up on food and supplies before it also closed.

All smiles: Santi Matthews of Raleigh, North Carolina picks out a blue sled from the selection at Smith Hardware on Hillsborough Street on Tuesday, a rare tree for a normally sled free part of the country

‘They were buying hurricane stuff, including a lot of spirits, of course,’ said Edwin Moreno, manager at Dorignac's Food Center in suburban New Orleans where sales of alcoholic beverages soared.

The bad weather prompted a federal judge in Knoxville, Tennessee, to postpone court proceedings part way through a sentencing hearing for three peace activists, including an elderly nun.

Winter weather advisories were also issued for a wide swath of eastern and central Texas for Tuesday, with predictions of up to 1 inch of snow near the state's border with northern Louisiana.

Rain and freezing temperatures combined to snarl the morning commute through large parts of central Texas and Louisiana, where roads and bridges were iced over. Police in Austin, Texas, reported more than 150 crashes caused by icy roads but said there had been no fatalities.

Frozen: A girl walks by frozen Lake Michigan in Chicago on Tuesday as the Midwest remains blanketed in ice

Snow day: A front end loader fills a semi trailer with snow to clear a school bus lot in Kalamazoo, Michigan

Danger: A truck slides out of control as he tries to avoid another wrecked truck on I-65 in Clanton, Alabama

Long wait: Ice conditions cause traffic jams along I-55 in north Jackson, Mississippi on Tuesday

NO LET UP: SUNDAY'S SUPER BOWL TO BE COLDEST ON RECORD

Sun is forecasted for the Super Bowl kickoff this Sunday - but it will still be the coldest on record.

The Weather Channel predicts a high of 37F (3C) and a low of 24 F (-4C) on Sunday with sun, a low chance of showers and slow winds in East Rutherford, New Jersey, home to the MetLife Stadium.

While this is far kinder than commentators, fans and meteorologists have predicted in the weeks leading up to Sunday's game, it will still take the crown for the coldest ever Super Bowl.

The current record is 39 degrees, which was set in 1972 in New Orleans.

Winter storm alerts were issued Tuesday by the National Weather Service stretching from central
Texas through the Gulf Coast into Georgia, the Carolinas and
far southeast Virginia.

Eastern and central Texas endured the biggest snow threat in the South, while east North Carolina and southeast
Virginia could get more than six inches
of snow, The Weather Channel reported.

Weather
Channel meteorologist Nick Wiltgen
described it as a 'potentially paralyzing winter storm', while winter
weather expert, Tom Niziol, said the South could expect weather 'that
many parts have not seen in years' - perhaps the
biggest ice storm in a generation, NBC reported.

Schools from the Lone Star State to Florida will be closed on Tuesday, while more than 400 flights
at Hartsfield–Jackson Atlanta International Airport and more than 300 at
George Bush Intercontinental Airport have already been canceled for the day, NBC reported.

Brutal: UW-Oshkosh student Vincent Fabbri is bundled up as he walks to campus in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, where a wind child warning is in effect and temperatures are in double digits below zero

Chill: Despite low temperatures, Jack Gaspari, of Sioux Falls, South Dakota, walks his dogs in a local park

Prepared: A snow thrower blows snow from the sidewalk in front of an Elkhart, Indiana elementary school

Shelter: Sevierville Primary School students are let out early due to snow in Sevierville, Tennessee

Already 80 million people are affected by wind chill advisories.

By Friday, however,
temperatures will rise above normal for much of the country, according to NBC News'
Al Roker.

By Wednesday, the winter storm will head towards the East Coast and reach up to Rhode Island, before heading off shore later that afternoon.

Brutal cold will also continue to blanket the Midwest on Tuesday, as wind chills will reach 50 degrees
below zero across the Great Lakes.

Schools will also be shuttered across cities including Cleveland, Cincinnati, Milwaukee, Detroit, Minneapolis and Indianapolis, and government offices in Indianapolis, Galveston and Milwaukee County will also be closed.

Wrapped up: Morning commuters are seen bundled up in Chicago, where temperatures are 11 below zero

Protection: A homeless man bundles up in blankets in dowtown Chicago on Tuesday morning

Icy stroll: A walker braved sub-zero temperatures for a morning walk around Lake Harriet in Minneapolis

Slide: A parent gives his child a push down the hills that surround the soccer fields at Belhaven University

Making the most of it: Belhaven University students Caleb Wiechmann, left, and James Lewallen take advantage of the snow and ice to throw snowballs at each other at the Jackson, Mississippi campus

The University of Michigan in Ann Arbor closed on Tuesday, the first time in 35 years. Tulane University in New Orleans and The Ohio State University in Columbus also canceled classes.

Amtrak has also canceled a number of train routes in and out of Chicago on Tuesday because of the frigid weather conditions.

The temperatures are also causing ice to
accumulate on the Mississippi and Illinois rivers, slowing the movement
of grain barges to the U.S. Gulf, according to Drew Lerner, a
meteorologist at World Weather Inc.

National Weather Service meteorologist
Andrew Krein blamed the weather on a surge of arctic high pressure out
of Canada that has spread over the upper Midwest and central plains.

Even weather-hardy Midwesterners expressed weariness on Monday with the sub-zero cold snap, the second this month.

Ice view: Rivers around Pittsburgh are frozen on Tuesday as temperatures read around 5 degrees

Treacherous: Rescue Squad members in Sevier County, Tennessee extricate a driver after the vehicle slid into a van that was blocking the road. The team worked on more than a dozen wrecks in the area

Blanketed: Snow is plowed outside the Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church north east of Elkhart, Indiana

Bizarre: Snow rollers dot a field near Oil City, Pennsylvania on Monday. The snow rollers are the result of an ideal combination of temperature, snow and wind